Display and measurement are three-dimensionally displayed in ultrasonic three-dimensional image diagnosis of a heart, and thus an examination efficiency has been required to be enhanced by displaying and operating methods which are not troublesome for an examiner and also are easily understandable by the examiner. Information which the examiner intends to observe is a part of three-dimensional data containing a large amount of information, and a technique of handling this information efficiently is required. At present, there has been required an operation of subjecting a three-dimensional image to rendering display, rotating or enlarging/reducing the three-dimensional image by using input equipment such as a trackball and adjusting a rendering threshold value, thereby acquiring a desired image while searching.
As a technique of enhancing the efficiency of measurement setting in three-dimensional measurement, a system has been proposed in which a two-dimensional image extracted from three-dimensional data by an apparatus is displayed to set a measurement target area, and an examiner manually operates input equipment such as a joystick to adjust the position of a measurement target region while observing the two-dimensional image in Patent Document 1.